In search of healthy and fun meals to feed my family, with an eye toward sustainable living.

Here you'll find recipes & ramblings about keeping my family fed with what's available in Alaska between local produce, a little bit of wild harvest, and the modern grocery store.

Saturday, June 27, 2009

Gardening w/ youngsta

Youngest and I were working in our garden last night. She has her own box, right next to mine, and she's still learning to recognize weeds -- but learning FAST. But her carrots needed thinning, and that turned out to cause a bit of a crisis, it seemed.Here's our conversation, as I remember it:

Y: But I don't want to pull the baby carrots!M (Me or Mom): But they're all crowded in there! We need to make some room for them to grown their yummy orange roots by pulling a few of the punier ones.Y: How would you feel if someone came along and pulled you out by your roots just because you're a little puny?!"

That stumped me! I started wondering if having her own gardening plot was such a good idea, when she promptly started yanking out a few carrots in the thicker patches, doing a great job making room thinning her row: "Ahh, Mom, I was just pulling your chain!" she laughed.

But she did admit she liked growing plants that did not have to be "beheaded" like the Bok Choy in my garden -- she prefers herbs like parsley and chives (she's always been my little helper who runs out to the garden with a pair of scissors when I need a little of this or that for dinner), and harvesting the snap peas (fruit, not whole plant) will be more to her liking. She was a bit horrified earlier during radish harvest -- there was nothing left!!!

About this blog

Borealkitchen is a blog by an amateur-- I simply enjoy cooking a variety of foods. I was inspired after we started getting a weekly CSA box last winter, which forced me to plan ahead more. This blog is my way of organizing menus and recipes, sharing my family's experiences, plus reflect on food-related issues. I also grow a garden, shop at Farmer's Markets as much as I can, and there's even a little bit of wild harvest as well...Philosophy: Good food, wholesome, mostly. My approach is more product-based than recipe-driven. By this I mean that I try to find something to do with what's in season: this week it might be an abundance of beets, cabbage or collard greens -- then I start searching for meals to incorporate them... I think of recipes as "starting points": when I start cooking, I just start improvising...

My RECIPES are rarely precise: I often just list ingredients ("Bah-humbug" to measuring, except for baking!). If I list recipes from a cookbook, I give the source and variations I've made. If a recipe came from a website, then you'll need to follow the link to the source for the "nitty-gritty" details of that recipe.

Feel free to comment or ask questions. Thanks for visiting!

About Me

I call Alaska home, but am originally from Germany. I'm incredibly lucky to have a job as a naturalist, teaching and hiking the great outdoors. My family:
The Prof (my husband);
Eldest (flown the coop);
Wolfman (teenage son);
Liesl (youngest pixie).